Hours Pass, and Still She Counts The Minutes
by creation sabina
Summary: by Kalina. My take on season 7 of BTVS. Spike has a soul. There is no First nor Potential Slayers. Buffy must learn to face and accept the darkness inside her. Spuffy.
1. Prologue

**Disclaimer** I own no one in this story, they all belong to the god that is Joss Whedon.

**Author** Kalina

**Hours Pass, And Still She Counts The Minutes**

_Prologue_

The first moments were unbearable, like years, stretched out over a harsh burning tarpaulin of time. The pain was harsh and fresh and bleeding. The world seemed to small to contain the enormity of his pain.

Cold tears would not stop flowing, racing down his face like little boats on a river.

The sobs that racked his body almost broke his ribs, so fervent were they in their pursuit of freedom from such a cage.

Had he been human, he would have killed himself.

Willow talked him out of driving a stake through his heart. She said they needed him, even though the others would hardly admit it. He was the only one strong enough to defend the Hellmouth. From vampires, demons, apocalypses. She said he ought to do it in honor of her memory. It was pathetic; _he_ was pathetic, carrying on like this. He knew it.

As if he didn't have the sodding bot to remind him. Silly piece of machinery. Plastic made alive to look just like her, smell like her, talk like her. No, not talk like her. Buffy would never have such joviality in her voice when she would talk to him. She'd be exasperated, furious, even, a voice imbued with all the hues of hatred. He knew he was pathetic. He knew he was stupid. He couldn't help it.

When she had come back, his world had fallen apart. He hid from her, shielding himself from the good that was her. He was evil. She had told him as much, repeatedly. He'd been shocked when she confessed in him, as if he was the only one who really understood her. Of course he was. The idiots that had brought her back hadn't been told as much. _He had_.

He'd felt, for once, power over them. Something that wasn't likely in a world where good almost always triumphed over evil.

Bleeding fairy tale, it was.

When she had surrendered herself to him, everything had crumbled. Passion had been lit, lust awoken. She craved closure, he love. They both wanted something the other could never give.

He'd called her his girl. And she had nearly destroyed him for it.

_You don't have a soul. There is nothing good or clean in you. You are dead inside._

_I could never be your girl._

He hated her and loved her. The hate was ancestral, a greedy need for her blood, for her destruction. The love was his. He knew he could blame it on all bloody things in the world, Drusilla, the Initiative, the chip. The fact would remain. None of that changed a damn thing. He loved her.

She never would. Someone with a soul always would have her heart. Stupid ponce. She looked down on him because he lacked a soul. As if it was his fault. He didn't _ask_ for eternal life, though, in retrospect, he never had questioned it nor minded it.

Still, not his bloody fault.

Bent like a puppy, he'd gone to seek redemption. Seek a soul, to make her love him.

_To be a kind of man..._

What a broken hunchback he'd been. He'd sought a soul to be a kind of man who would walk straight and proud.

He crumpled.

But still, he hoped, that she'd be the girl to straighten his back and bring him out of the darkness.

He'd lived with a foot in either realm for so long.

Now, it was time for a decision.


	2. Chapter 1: The Edge

**The Edge**

They made a sorry pair, the two of them did. Him, hanging his head over the cross' shallow edge, watching his flesh char and the smoke curl up towards the empty night sky. Her, breathing stopped, eyes frozen on his broken form, unable to move, unable to understand, comprehend, what had happened. Her makeshift stake clattered to the ground, useless now, among the rubble and remains of the pews. Her lip trembled, and her body shuddered, knees bucking, wanting to run. This was far beyond her. She did not want to accept the idea of sacrifice, nor want it to happen. Yet it did, she remaining still as the air in the lonely church grew denser with the smell of burning flesh. His penance was for her, to pardon himself for what he had done.

_I hurt the girl_.

She had not forgiven him, was far, too far away from that, and here he was, begging her not to forgive him, so that he could hurt himself longer. Pain might just be a figment of his imagination, a cruelty inflicted to bring a sort of redemption that she would never allow. She stood there, and he stood there, and they waited until the other would give, run away, hide, howl. His long white fingers curled into fists and raked the edge of the cross, a scream alighting in his throat, the fire burning from inside. She swayed, the track of the single tear fallen scorching the skin of her cheek. How she wished she could leave! How she wanted to stay! The monster inside of her bucked, remembering all the atrocities that had happened when he was around. The trust he had broken. The lines he had crossed. The way he had made her _feel_ a pain so intense she nearly shattered. The way he had touched her. Her heart hardened as she remembered, and the flitting pity she had felt for the desolate creature in front of her dissipated, like dust in the wind. And the monster inside her smirked its hideous smile.

She turned away, her hand at the knob, when she heard his strangled sob. A stumbling step, the sounds of his feet against the wood of the destroyed pew, and his hand was on her shoulder. She whirled around, ready, if he were to harm her. The smell of burnt flesh grew nearer, and the darkness masked his eyes. The low rumble of his faltering voice enveloped her. The wounds from the cross were still smoking.

"I brought the teacher an apple, but all she wants to do is whip me." She looked away, her hand still tightly holding his wrist, her neck twisted. The scars on her throat still remained from the two times she had been tasted.

"I'm the whipping boy," he whispered, his fingers tracing the cicatrix. His nose brushed her earlobe and she stiffened, terrified, as she wheeled her head around and thrust him away.

"Right then. Whipping boy. Quickly now. Run, run, run. Away. Away from the bad teacher. Hide under the desk. In the dark." He choked. "Go to hell."

"Spike, who...?" she murmured.

"They tell me to run. Everyone I ... Everyone. The little girl. Scandinavia." He gave a half-hearted scoff. "Oh, she had pretty little reindeer." He looked up at the ceiling and cringed. "The gods up there don't want me any longer. Don't like me. Can't be hurt. Want to hide. Want to run. Listen...listen. Birds. Daffodils." He smiled sickly. "Springtime for the Slayer. Hear the songs."

She walked away from him, her hand running along the edge of the only pew standing.

"But, shhh. Don't share the joy. Not with the bad man. All of this, love, it's just smoke and mirrors. No birds or daisies." He twisted his head to look at her, dark blue eyes boring into hers. "Just skeletons, pet. Of everyone around us."

He straightened his shoulders and looked past her. "I memorized my lesson, I did, teacher. And I've recited it." He cocked his head. "May I write on the chalkboard?"

Buffy turned and fled the church.

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"He's changed, Xander," Buffy told him quietly. Xander sighed, leaning forwards, hands crossed. His small black eyes looked at her, and he felt pity, not sorrow, for what she had become.

"But into what, Buff? I mean, he's still Mr Buffy Obsession, isn't he?" Buffy's memory flashed. _Make me bleed_, she had pleaded, and he had obeyed. She had had just as much of an obsession with the pain he brought her than he had with her.

"He has a soul." Buffy sighed. "I don't know what it means, but he has a soul and he's changed. But for better or for worse, I have no idea."


End file.
